MACHESNEY PARK — The Rev. Frank Moyer, a pro-choice Lutheran minister and hospital chaplain who taught thousands of people how heal and deal with illness by looking beyond it, died Wednesday.

Moyer, who turned 84 Monday and was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in March, started the professional chaplaincy program at Rockford Memorial Hospital in 1966. As director of pastoral service, he ministered to the sick and their loved ones, and trained pastors and lay ministers to look deeper into what sickness meant to people they counseled and consoled.

“What’s the meaning of that illness?” was his signature question.

“It’s not that illness is a positive, but he asked, How does this change your life? How do you reconcile this with your value system?” his son Mike said. “How does this direct how you feel from this time forward about the choices you may make or feel compelled to make?”

“He was a mentor to a lot of people, someone who really listened and guided them into becoming more active with their own health and their own growing up,” said the Rev. Jim Roberts, who was trained by Moyer and will officiate at his friend’s memorial service at 4 p.m. Sunday at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, 1826 N. Rockton Road.

Roberts said chaplains historically took clinical pastoral-education classes to learn the psychology of healing. Moyer taught people how to use spirituality to make healing holistic.

In 1983 he told an interviewer: “To me, it’s a challenge to show people that their faith is a resource. I want to find the thing in their value system that helps them cope.”

Moyer, who also taught ethics at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Rockford, was an activist for social justice. He championed women’s reproductive rights and, in 1970, formed a clergy group that counseled women seeking safe and legal abortions.